Homogenization of porous piezoelectric materials

This paper presents a homogenization study of porous piezoelectric materials through analytical and numerical analysis. Using two of the most well-known analytical methods for theoretical homogenization, the Mori-Tanaka and self-consistent schemes, the full set of material properties are obtained. These results are compared to two different theoretical bounds, the Halpin-Tsai and Hashin-Sthrikman bounds. A numerical model of a representative volume element is then developed using finite element analysis for different percentages of inclusions. Finally, the analytical and numerical results are compared and discussed; a good agreement between the analytical and numerical methods is shown.